After All This Time
by ibreak4CSI
Summary: [GC angst] After all this time, he still missed her.


**Note: Ah, I can't believe it's been almost two months since I posted anything! .hides. Forgive me? Please? I really do have a couple things in the works. If only I could get my plot bunnies to stay with me past the first couple chapters, I would be great! LOL**

**Summary: After all this time, he still missed her.**

**Rating: PG**

**WARNING: Character death! **

**After All This Time**

The cold Nevada wind blew. You could hear it whistling through the trees, and it permeated even the thickest coat. Accompanying this was the drizzle. Microscopic particles of liquid, coating everything with a slick layer of moisture.

And yet, despite all this, here he was. Slipping and sliding his way up the grassy knoll where Catherine's tombstone was. Where he liked to think _she_ was.

It had been six years.

Six years since she was attacked at that crime scene. But that time, she didn't make it. She had been shot twice in the chest, and he had been the one to find her.

Toan outsider, his next actions would have been mistaken as calculated and precise, executed without the slightest bit of difficulty. But that would be a complete misconception. For on the inside, he was shaking like a leaf, denying the site in front of his eyes, even as he checked her pale, lifeless body for a pulse, and found none. No slight reassuring thump, no blood running through her veins.

Instead, the cold, clamminess of her skin repulsed his own flesh, and he jerked his hand away, as if he had been burned. He may as well have been a rookie CSI, for the nausea that welled up inside him as he sat there, staring at the body.

For that's what she had been turned into. His best friend, his secret love. She had been reduced to a corpse. Just a lump of flesh and bone, waiting to be cut open, sewn back up, and buried underneath the dusty soil of Las Vegas.

Harsh sobs of grief had echoed through the air of his townhouse that night, and every night after, for weeks. For, although he a maintained stone cold façade - especially at the funeral - to the few that really knew him, the heartbreaking turmoil in his eyes was obvious.

He had quit his job as the CSI graveshift Supervisor exactly one week after her funeral. For, although he liked to think it wasn't true, he was only human, with normal human emotions. Including grief. It was impossible to block out all the memories, and therefore impossible to continue working in that building. He could have transferred to another city, but then he would be leaving her, just like she had left him.

No, he didn't blame her; he knew it wasn't her fault. But he didn't want to betray her either. It was difficult to explain the workings of a grieving mind, but that was how he felt. Besides, he had been meaning to get out of the profession for years. Only Catherine and their friendship had held him back.

And those things had disappeared, been laid to rest within the morbid, tan coffin. So he retreated into his townhouse, relying on his extensive knowledge of entomology for a living. Today, he was a borderline famous scientific author, having published many papers along with a book on entomology.

And yet, despite his deep love for insects, and his mission to submerse himself in them until he thought of nothing else, here he was. As he was every single month on this day, like a man obsessed. Rain didn't matter. Scorching heat didn't matter, nor did biting cold.

Only she mattered.

Because, after all this time, he still missed her.

Hell, "missed her" didn't even come close to matching his longing - no, his absolute _yearning_ to be with her.

He did the same thing every time he came. He placed single red rose on the engraved granite, and tossed the old, withered one aside, into a pile he cleared every few months.

As he knelt there, muddy liquid soaking uncomfortably into the threads of his black slacks, he prayed to a God he wasn't sure existed, only for one thing. That he would be with her again someday.

And then, he gently placed his fingertips on the stone, as a tear slipped down his cheek, followed by another. Although today it was masked by the bitter, howling wind, his whisper was the same as it always was.

"I love you, Catherine."

Then a few more salty tears trailed down the hollows of his already damp face, and he stood, his body leaving, but his heart and mind staying.

Even now, after all this time.

And he knew they always would.

**The End**

**A/N: Generally, I don't really care for this kind of fic (although there are a couple exceptions) and have never attempted to write one, but the dang plot bunny just wouldn't quit bugging me. So any reviews as to how I did would be much appreciated.**


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